Jeff Lipton of Peerless Mastering >>>>

Jeff Lipton of
Peerless Mastering >>>>
by Andy Hong
Do you think this is a case of the
technology driving the trend... or
the trend driving the technology?
I’m thinking Finalizer, Waves L2,
various “mastering” plug-ins...
I don’t know. It is certainly easier to get things louder
with the new technology. I think in my case, the
clients come in with a very compressed record and
say, make mine as loud as this one. I explain the pros
and cons, but they almost always decide on “louder!”
What are some of the more memorable
sessions you’ve had?
Mastering.
Let’s see… one of the most complicated projects I’ve
worked on was The Magnetic Fields 69 Love Songs.
Before I heard the songs, I was skeptical that even a
genius like Stephin could pull off a record with so
many songs and make it interesting and listenable; but
he not only pulled it off, he created one of my favorite
records of all time. I would go so far as to say that I
think almost every song is a masterpiece. The
Magnetic Fields are great to work with. They give me
creative freedom to do what I feel is best for their
material, but just enough guidance so that I
understand what they are hoping to achieve. In this
case, we had a strict deadline, so it was not possible
for them to have all the songs mixed before the
mastering began; and also for 46 songs they hadn’t
yet decided on an order. This made it especially
important for all the tracks to be very closely matched
sonically. I ended up spending over an hour on every
single song on the record. All the songs were recorded
under different circumstances, and a lot were recorded
in a home studio. And the songs had a huge range of
musical styles. It was lots of fun. It’s rare that I get to
work on a multi-week mastering project! Jack Drag’s
most recent albums were great projects. On one
record, John Dragonetti had a concept for how the
songs should flow into each other, so we spent a lot
of time coming up with creative edits to create the
flow of the record. I worked on the new Kelly Joe
Phelps record for Rykodisc, which was recorded at
Long View Farms and produced by George Howard.
That record is so warm and beautiful, like Bob Dylan’s
album Time Out Of Mind, or Tom Waits’ Rain Dogs.
original performance, which wouldn’t have been
It’s kind of like the snake oil of
possible
to present over the air. To do this, I used
making records. It’s that secret elixir that gives your
a
nalog
EQ,
some additional analog compression, and
songs sheen, size, and consistency. It brings out the
s
e
v
e
ral
mu
l
t
iband expanders, and digital equalizers. I
best sound in your recordings, while helping to control
also worked on stereo imaging and optimizing the
any audible problems or mishaps. And it’s what makes
recording for the CD format vs. the radio format.
your records sound good no matter where they’re played.
Speaking
of expanders, when most
Mastering is one of the most demanding recording
recording
engineers think about
sciences. It requires an extremely neutral listening
taking
their
mixes to a mastering
environment and equipment with pristine audioengineer,
they
think about EQ,
handling capabilities. It also requires an engineer who
compression,
and
limiting - making
can listen with objective ears - both to the music and to
things
sound
balanced
and loud.
the client’s requests - and make precise adjustments to
I’ve noticed that you spend just as
the sound. Jeff Lipton started mastering records late at
much time expanding as you do
night in his bedroom back in 1993, when friends would
compressing. In fact, I can’t recall
ask him to make their records sound more polished.
ever going to another mastering
Realizing that he had a much-sought-after skill, he
engineer who’s used an expander
opened the original incarnation of Peerless Mastering in
like you do...
Boston in 1995. Business expanded, and he now owns a
I
think
a lot of recordings have suffered from too much
world-class facility, housing two mastering suites, just
c
o
m
p
ression, which can bury things and takes away
outside Boston.
the life of the sounds. Not that I don’t think that
compression is an invaluable production and Are there producers or engineers you
The first time I heard your work, it was
like working with?
ma
stering tool, I just feel that recordings can
for Willard Grant Conspiracy’s album
Paul
Kolderie always sends me the most beautiful and
sometimes benefit from undoing some of the effects
Weevils in the Captain’s Biscuit,in
t
ex
tural mixes. Phil Greene - he has the best
of compression, which of course is an effect in itself.
1998. The recording was from a live
t
e
c
h
nical knowledge of anybody I’ve worked with.
broadcast I engineered on WMBR Louder, louder, louder...
Mark
Miller and Thom Monahan of Slaughter House
Radio in Cambridge, MA. I was blown Exactly. The current market seems to feel that the
in
Western
Mass are great. Jim Siegal of the Outpost
away by how amazingly clear and louder their record sounds, the better it is. This
always
sends
great material. Basically, I’ve just
is a trend that I hope to help reverse. I am
dynamic the CD sounded, considering
been blessed to work on some really great projects.
amazed by how few of my customers understand
that the original recording was lo-fi literally recorded off of the radio. Do
you remember what you did?
The recording was definitely optimized for radio. It was
pretty compressed. The Willard Grant Conspiracy is a
band with beautiful instrumental textures, and in the
case of this recording, I think there were 7 or 8
musicians playing at once. I wanted to open up the
recording so that you could clearly hear every
instrument and add back in some of the life of the
the compromises that have to be made in order How about Sebadoh’s lo-fi sound? How
did mastering contribute to it?
to make a recording “louder.” There is no “11”
T
hey
specifically asked that we maintain lo-fi qualities
on the knob. But, people often tell me to turn it
to
the recording. On the album version of “Flame,”
up, but don’t compress it any more. The loudest
t
he
first single, Lou Barlow asked me to mix two
any digital signal can be is digital zero. So the
m
i
xes
together because he loved both of them and
only way to make something that peaks near
couldn’t
choose between them. One mix was by Eric
digital zero louder, is to compress it heavily,
Masunaga, and another was by Rich Costy. This is
then add makeup gain to get it as close to zero
not a normal mastering request! But they loved the
as possible without clipping.
double-mixed version and used it.
SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY:
Ashley Stove - All Summer Long
How did you learn the trade?
The A-Room has to be the most neutral
I started mastering live recordings of bands in Sound
sounding room I’ve ever heard!
D
e
s
ig
ner
II
in
the
early
‘90s.
I
would
just
listen
very
Even
after the room itself was built, Bob Alach spent a year
Avoid One Thing - Avoid One Thing
carefully and experiment with EQ and compression
tuning it. Right down to moving cinder blocks by
until I had what I was looking for. The tools were
millimeters and angling the speakers by fractions of
crude, but I was able to learn a lot using them.
degrees. Behind all those hand-picked fabric walls are
How do you know that the “sound” you
suspended bass traps, and even the doors were specially
hear in this room will translate well to
shaped to offer the correct diffusion. The room is
Dropkick Murphys - “Sing Loud, Sing Proud”
other people’s rooms, cars, spaces, etc? essentially flat from 8 Hz to 40 kHz, and the SLS
Either/Orchestra - Afro-Cubism, Francine That comes from a lot of listening. I often take my
monitors and the Bag End subwoofers utilize that whole
Future Bible Heroes - Eternal Youth mastered albums and listen to them in a lot of range. I can completely trust what I’m hearing in this
different environments - as many as possible. In
room, so I can make better decisions. Also, you may have
my mastering rooms, you can hear every detail of
noticed that the main speakers are placed so that where
the recording. In many listening environments,
you’re slouching down on the couch, you hear them at
Jeff Tweedy / Wilco - Chelsea Walls Soundtrack
aspects of the recording are masked by frequency
the same angle as I hear them sitting in my chair at the
cancellation, or frequencies are summed by
engineer’s position. If you like what you hear in this
reflections. I try first to make the recording
room - or dislike what you hear - you’ll like or dislike the
sound as good as possible, flat, which really
same things in real-world listening environments.
does translate well to other listening I’ve noticed that you’ve gathered quite
Seana Carmody - Struts and Shocks environments. The monitoring in a mastering a quiver of HDCD Processors from
room may be the most important part of the
Pacific Microsonics.
process. Being able to trust what you hear is Yes, we have three Model IIs and two Model Is. I find them
essential to being able to make the decisions
to be the greatest converters I’ve ever heard. Their
needed
to
master
a
record.
I
have
been
fortunate
dithering process is also remarkable. We use them for
Thalia Zedek - You’re a Big Girl Now
to have worked with top acousticians: Bob Alach
both stereo and 5.1 dithering and monitoring. We use
The Pernice Brothers - World Won’t End
of Alactronics, who designed my A-Room; and
the converters to convert digital signal to analog for
Michael Blackmer, who designed the B-Room.
analog processing all the time. And you and I have
Blake Hazard - Little Airplane
Chris Brokaw - Red Cities
Chuck E. Weiss - Extremely Cool
Helms – Swimmer, McCarthy
Jack Drag - The Sun Inside LP
Karate - Some Boots
Magnetic Fields - 69 Love Songs
Matthew - Everybody Down
Sinners & Saints - Sky Is Falling
Stephin Merritt - Eban & Charley
Victory at Sea – The Good Night
v/a - Amos House Collection Vols. 1 & 2
v/a - Hamlet (2000) Soundtrack
Wow! How tight was the timing between
the two mixes? Did you let them go
in and out of exact tempo lock?
I actually lined them up at the sample level, as best as
possible. They were both at slightly different speeds;
and they have very different effects on them; so the
different delays and reverbs did cause a cool
phasiness to occur. But the snare drum hits are pretty
much lined up. It took a really long time to do this.
What’s the typical amount of time you
put into a project? Say a full-length
CD with 10 songs...
It depends on the budget. If a client wants to put the time
in to make everything perfect, it can average an hour
a song. If a client needs to master something within a
very small budget, I can work in as little as 15 minutes
per song - depending on the song lengths that is.
How did you get into mastering? At
what point did you decide, “I’m
going to be a mastering engineer”?
I have always been obsessed with sound quality. It just
seemed like a natural career for me. I love music, and
I love to help people achieve their creative visions.
The walls in your B-Room are um...
unique...
talked a great deal about how the HDCD process on the
final master comes close to achieving a 20-bit sound
out of 16-bits. It’s quite fascinating, but very real too.
Michael Blackmer calls that his “multi room within a room”
design. Because of the way the reflections occur depending And what about this Weiss box?
on where you are in the room, it sounds like a different The Weiss EQ1-LP is a great, transparent EQ. It’s linearlistening space. This is very useful for testing the way
phase, so unlike normal EQs, it only affects amplitude
material sounds before it leaves the studio. The A-Room has
in the frequency domain - it has constant group-delay
a much more consistent sound. It has a giant sweet spot in the frequency domain. It also has a more normal
everyone in the room is basically hearing the same thing.
mode, which also sounds great, but not as transparent.
60/61 The Creative Music Rec ording Magazine
continuedon
onthe
thenext
nextpage>>>
page>>>
continued
You used it a good deal in conjunction
with M+S processing on the new
Nedelle CD that John Baccigaluppi
and I brought in.
particular studio, but it won’t sound as good anywhere
else. A high-end mastering facility will offer the client a
nearly perfect room, where there are no handicaps to
their decision-making. This, along with the fact that we
have gear that is specifically designed for mastering,
offering the lowest coloration possible, gives us the
ability to make a recording sound as good as it can, no
matter where it’s heard.
Mid/Side processing is such an amazing tool. By being able
to EQ or change the dynamics of the center image
separately from the side image, it is possible to, say,
bring out a buried vocal track, without affecting the
instruments that are mixed primarily off center. If I And what should the client expect to get
out of the mastering session?
recall correctly, you needed the relative volume of the
vocals changed in two of the songs, and in general the An album that sounds clearer, more precise, warmer, wellmatched. The songs should flow well together. Even
Weiss EQ across the Mid gave the vocal a bit of shine.
songs recorded at different times or different facilities
Also, one of the songs had cymbals that were a teeny
should play back in a cohesive manner. With me, a
bit harsh, so I put a multiband compressor on the Side
client should expect a very personal touch. Basically, I
to take out some of the upper-midrange harshness
try to understand each client’s artistic vision for the
without affecting the airiness of the cymbals or the
project; and then I try to help them reach their goal as
quality of the snare.
best as I can, so that their sound reproduces as they
Do you prefer getting projects in digital
want it to - wherever it’s heard. When a client leaves,
or on tape?
they should be happier with their recording and with
1/2’’ analog tape. It sounds warmer and more accurate
the way their album sounds. That to me is what makes
than 44.1 kHz, 24-bit. However, I do think that 192 k
mastering a very satisfying process. r
or 176.4 k sounds pretty great.
For the engineer or band who’s putting www.peerlessmastering.com
together songs to bring to a mastering
house for the first time, what things Andy Hong, www.kimcheecords.com
should the engineer or band know?
A well-documented project is very easy to work with. Make
all edit decisions before mastering (not the edits, just
the decisions). Use meaningful labels on everything. If
you bring your mixes on CD-R, a data CD-R is better
than an audio CD-R. Data CD-Rs have true errorcorrection while audio CDs use interpolation if the
errors are bigger than what can be handled by the
limited correction. And a data CD-R will offer you more
resolution than an audio CD-R if your source files are
better than 44.1/16. If you bring your project on tape,
don’t forget tones. A bass sweep or multiple bass tones
are better than a single bass tone. Leave the mastering
engineer some hiss before or after a song end, so they
can use better noise reduction if needed. If you’re
attending a session, bring in some of your favorite CDs
so both you and the mastering engineer know what to
expect. Plus, you’ll get to hear the CDs in the
mastering room, so it’ll be easier to comment on the
sounds you’ll hear during mastering of your own
project. And finally, it’s sometimes a good idea to do a
“vocal up” mix. After you’ve done your “final” mix, you
can do one more with the exact same settings, but
with the vocal up a dB or two. Bring both to the
session. You might be surprised when you hear your
songs outside of your own studio.
Why should an artist working in a home
or project recording studio bother
with professional mastering?
High-end professional mastering is more important now
than ever because more and more artists are choosing
to work at non-professional or budget recording studios.
Most of these lower-end facilities do not have precise,
acoustically designed rooms, where you can hear just
the music and not the room. Basically, working in less
than optimal conditions leaves the engineer and artist
guessing at what the music really sounds like, and they
will optimize their mixes to a room that has its own
imperfections. In other words, it sounds great in that
www.tapeop.com
free subscriptions online!
The
Hangar
A great tracking ro o m
in No rt h ern
C a l i f o rnia open
to freelance engineers
and studio-savvy
musicians.
2 inch 16 & 24 track:
$250/day
24 track Digital:
$200/day
Huge recording room w/ 30 ft.
ceilings and lots of isolation areas.
MCI two inch recorder. MOTU, Mac G4,
Pro Tools LE (002), Logic, Cubase, DP
Lucid clock, Swissonic converters.
32 channel Soundcraft Ghost console.
Preamps/dynamics: Millenia Media (5),
Neve 1272 (2) & 1073 EQ, Avalon 737,
UA 2-610 & LA-2A, Drawmer 1969/MX60,
Daking Pre/EQ (2), Focusrite ISA 220,
Telefunken V72 (2), Altec 438C & 1567,
Meek VC1&6Q, Distressor (2),
Summit MPC-100A & TLA 50.
Mics: Neumann U-67, Telefunken 251,
Soundeluxe U-99, RCA 77, AKG 414’s,
451, Shure KSM-32, SM-58/57/56’s,
Sennheiser 409’s, Earthworks TC-30’s,
Blue Mouse/Blueberry, Royer R121’s,
more.
Lots of album credits.
For more info contact John:
916-444-5241
<John@tapeop.com>
<www.tapeop.com/john>